More than nine months have passed since the December 14, 2012, school shooting attack upon Sandy Hook Elementary School in the Newtown, Connecticut, school district where 20 children and 6 school staff members were left dead. The horrific nature of the attack upon our youngest and most vulnerable children — elementary students — served as […]
Category Archive: Shootings – Mass
School safety: Security assessments post-Sandy Hook shootings
“Fast” does not equate to “best.” This was my response in a communication with a private school administrator who shared with me yesterday that her school’s board of trustees had been pondering a school security assessment for three months, but then when the Sandy Hook Elementary School shooting occurred, they wanted the process expedited. Since scheduling […]
Sandy Hook Elementary School shootings: School safety reflections
Bulletproof backpacks for students. Bulletproof vests for teachers. Arming teachers. Teaching children to attack armed intruders. These were among the many ideas bantered around in the news, online, and elsewhere across America in the days following the shooting deaths of 20 children and six adults at Sandy Hook Elementary School in Newtown, CT. The Today […]
Should school police have high-powered rifles in schools?
The Plainfield (IL) Police Department’s recent request to allow its School Resource Officers (SROs) to store AR-15 rifles in gun safes at their high school generated quite a buzz. (See the Chicago Tribune story entitled Assault rifles in schools a sign of the times.) But was the request really unreasonable? Actually, the request by the police is not unusual. […]
Prevent mass shootings? Aurora theater, Sikh temple, & schools
“Run. Hide. Fight.” That’s the Department of Homeland Security’s advice for staying safe during a shooting. “Buy a gun. Take self-defense classes. Teach kids to attack armed intruders in a school.” Those are some recommendations from others. Following recent mass shootings at an Aurora, Colorado, theater and at a Sikh temple in Wisconsin, the search for […]